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8/01/2014

Democratic party turnout in primaries is down more than the turnout for Republicans

While Republican turnout is down 1.4 percentage points, the turnout rate for Democrats is down by 2.6 percentage points. I guess that I would like to see a regression that accounted for whether races were contested, but this is suggestive. From The Hill newspaper:

The survey also showed that Democrats suffered a higher drop-off from 2010 than Republicans. Democratic turnout went from 8.7 percent of eligible voters in 2010 to 6.1 percent this year. Republican turnout dropped from 9.6 percent in 2010 to 8.2 percent.McDonald said that’s largely because most of the action has been taking place on the other side, and that Democrats will tune back in once there’s a reason to.

“We haven’t really seen Democrats have a reason to be interested in the election yet, because we’re not close to the fall election and their primaries haven’t been contested,” he said.

Still, Democratic base constituencies become disinterested during the midterms at higher rates than GOP-leaning groups, which is why Democrats have a tougher fight to get their voters out this fall. . . .